OpenPanel

By now, you should have a complete install of OpenPanel with a user, domain, website, FTP account, and E-mail address. Before we begin to install Drupal, there are a few packages we must install prior:

sudo apt-get install php5-mysql php5-gd

sudo a2enmod rewrite

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

This section about changing permissions is optional, however I recommend it because It makes the permissions more secure for an Apache Virtual Host environment with multiple users. If you look at the permissions in the home directory, you will notice that OpenPanel sets the default owner and group to the user you created.

By now, you should have a complete install of OpenPanel setup and working. Log into the OpenPanel Web GUI by going to ther URL: https://ipaddress:4089 and login using the username "openpanel-admin" and whatever password you configured.

Click on the User tab. In the bottom left corner, click the + symbol to create a new user. Fill out the form and select openpanel-admin as the owner:

Click on the Domain tab. In the bottom left corner, click the + symbol to create a new domain. Fill out the domain name and select "test", or whatever user you created as the owner:

Now select the domain name from the list on the left. Choose "Setup DNS Master". Fill in the domain name and hit Create:

Under Domain, click on the Website tab. Click "Setup Virtual Host". Fill out the domain name (optionally enter the site admin email address) and hit create:

If you are looking for an attractive, feature rich web hosting control panel, then OpenPanel is for you. It has a handful of features that make it stand out from the crowd, including an easy installation, sleek design, and simple management. Installing OpenPanel on Ubuntu, as you will see, is quite easy. It is all done through an OpenPanel repository and the package manager. Among other Open Source web hosting control panels, it is safe to say that OpenPanel has a much more attractive design than the others. Not only can you manage web servers with OpenPanel, you can manage the entire system very easily, including email, FTP, DNS, and updates. This tutorial is for beginners that are new to OpenPanel and need a step-by-step guide to the installation and configuration of OpenPanel.

To begin, I will assume you already have Ubuntu 10.04 installed, updated, and configured with a static IP address. The only additional packages you will need during installation are SSH. It is recommended that OpenPanel be installed on a fresh system with no additional servers running on it, so DO NOT install LAMP or anything else during the install of Ubuntu. All commands are ran as a normal user with sudo, unless otherwise noted.